PART
IX. SOME PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS
FOR WRITING A RELATIONSHIP CONTRACT

Now that you have read thru this book (or at
least parts of it),
you are ready to begin drafting your relationship contract.
Give yourselves plenty of time to do this.
Perhaps each party could volunteer to take half of the Questions
and create a first draft of what might become your Answers.
Then you could read thru each other's Answers and suggest revisions.

A. Identifying the Parties and the Purpose.

The opening paragraphs of your relationship
contract
should clearly identify the parties who are creating this contract
together.
Names and addresses should be included.

Then it might be useful to include a brief
history of your relationship.
When did you first meet?
When did you begin to have a meaningful personal relationship?
What phases has the relationship already been thru?

And it might also be wise to declare here at
the beginning
your basic purpose for writing a relationship contract.
For example, you could state that you reject
something about marriage laws and/or traditions
so that you want to create a more perfect union
than would be possible under the laws of your jurisdiction
or by simply following the traditions and customs of your culture.
If you want to have a relationship that gives the woman
more power than normally possible under marriage,
explain that purpose in your own words.
If there have been significant problems in your relationships,
perhaps this new agreement is intended to avoid such problems in the
future.

This part of your relationship contract can be
any length you please.
And each time you revise your contract,
you might want to add a paragraph or two,
reviewing what has happened since the last time you revised your
contract.
For example, if you have moved to a new house or had children,
these would be significant facts to include
in the historical part of your relationship contract.
Such changes in your lives together
will have an impact on some of the provisions in your relationship
contract.

PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS FOR A RELATIONSHIP
CONTRACT by James
Park 171

The page above begins this section of practical suggestions---which is
5 pages in all---from Designer
Marriage.